Cold Wind and Snow

Okay, it’s cold out!

Never mind freezing the balls off a brass monkey, it’s cold enough to freeze the balls off Frosty the Snowman himself! So cold in fact, that several GTA school bus companies – not to mention the schools themselves – decided to close for the day.

WTF?

Because it’s COLD?

And in the middle of February too. Imagine that!

Last night, you see, the temperature dropped down to a bone chilling –17 degrees (-34 with the wind chill). That’s pretty fucking cold I agree. But to prevent the children from going to school this morning - you enough, to learn stuff – that’s just ridiculous!

Never mind the kiddies just manning up to walk to the bus stops, but to think that the bus drivers, teachers, and school principals were too pussy to roll out of their nice warm beds? What kind of example are they setting for the youth of tomorrow?

It’s making my eye twitch.

I was never NOT allowed to go to school. Come hell or high water; come rain, sleet, snow, or shine, the student must get through. The issue of temperature was never even considered as a plausible variable for the cancellation of the school learning process.

Hell, my mother would send me out in weather that a Yeti wouldn’t wander out in. She practically planted a foot into my chest as she grabbed a hold of the door frame with both hands and shoved me out into the wintry No Mans Land. No way was I going to interfere with mommy’s Bob Barker time on the account of it being cold.

There were times I nearly lost limbs to frost bite or had my core temperature drop below that of a frozen carp before the bus actually arrived.

And if the bus didn’t arrive for some god-forsaken reason she’d send me packing on foot. Sometimes I felt like Hillary Scott mushing through the forbidding Arctic landscape. Well, by “mushing” I really mean my struggling through mountains of unplowed snowdrifts wafting in the city streets. Seriously, you could have hidden a mammoth in someone’s front yard where it’s wouldn’t be found until spring thaw.

I’m a survivor of the Blizzard of ’77 remember. You know? The one they called “WHITE DEATH”! So I’m no stranger to snow or the cold.

Too young to remember or ignorant to know about the White Death?

Here, let me log your memory:


That was no winter wonderland let me tell you! And do you know how much school they canceled?

NONE!

We WALKED our sorry primary asses to school in those days. I remember my cheeks literally melting off my face and my lips freezing together on some of my walks to school in February. I suffered through the early stages of hypothermia at my desk until lunch. By then my feet had thawed out and I cold walk again. But it was unthinkable to close the school and prevent the shaping of young minds.

Too cold?

“TOO FUCKING BAD! Get your near frozen ass to school and learn something.”

Why do we continue to coddle our children as we do? What are we protecting them from exactly? I understand that times were much harder in the past, but we turned out okay didn’t we? In fact, it’s the reason I’m filled with such a healthy dose of angry vigor today.

For good and for bad*, it made me who I am.

Besides, there should be a little toil in kid’s lives. Particularly when it comes to school. What do they say: ‘No pain no gain’?

And sure winter sucks but deal with it already! It’s not like my current employer would ever accept “because it’s chilly out” as an excuse for my not coming into work. My toasty ass would be out on the street by mid-morning coffee break. Consider it conditioning for being a responsible adult.

It’s teaching children the meaning of commitment. Plus, it’ll help prevent them from having their sorry asses pulverized into a pink paste by the bullies in high school later on.

I mean, honestly, what’s next? Canceling school due to a sever chance of heavy showers?

C’mon.

* Mostly bad.